farce poobah

Parise on a breakaway and its 1-0 !!!! OK, its Devils 1, Canadiens 0.

Why is it that everytime Hennessey says "Esposito", I get nervous? I have no idea whether he's any good, but the name itself conjures up images ....

The CCHA has now got it right. And since switching to their current format, they are winning more NCAA games. Time for the WCHA to stop beating our best teams up just before the season's biggest games - the NCAA. I would advocate a BYE WEEK for the top four seeds. Then a second week with four "quarterfinal" series - best of three. And a "final four" in St Paul. You can keep or delete the third place game. I like a team that takes pride at the chance to represent, anytime anyplace. However, since I believe WCHA would benefit from fewer league games at the end, I would vote to delete (and give our teams a longer rest for NCAA.)

Good question for Eades would be "who was better?"

That was the most bizarro game I've seen in a long time. Loved the Sioux play for long LONG stretches, including tons of point blank chances. Then the brown and yellow come down and get the bounce. Repeat. As Hak noted in the postgame, there was one mental mistake (Gleason firing into Lucia that led to the break) but I never thought we were out of it either, until the clock went inside 2 minutes. I was also happy that we played strong and clean in the third period. The bench is too damn short already, and we need ALL the healthy bodies and no suspensions going into Cornell (which is a more important weekend for PWR / NCAA purposes than the Minnesota games, oddly enough). Nice bit of discipline from what was a very frustrated bench. Its somewhat amazing that this was the first loss at Mariucci for any of the Sioux, even the seniors who end 4-1-1 at the John for their careers. Last, I agree with the comment (forget who should get credit) to switch Kristo off the line with Trupp and Malone. Put Kristo on a different line and get Trupp and Malone a 3rd playmaker for that line.

I have a good feeling about tonight's game. Get the first goal, build from there.

Not a good night for the WCHA: UW ties Yale UND ties ND Minn loses to Northern Michigan UMD loses to Vermont Good thing the rest of the weekend went well.

I'm withholding judgement until after Sunday's games - lot of big interconference matchups that will drive a LOT of PWR comparisons down the line. The UMD-Vermont, Wisconsin-Yale, UND-Notre Dame and Minnesota-Northern Michigan games are big.

Maybe Chris Porter will get a shot? PK has been a problem for St Louis, and he skates and reads plays really well.

As a fan of Caddyshack, I find Noonan an unfortunate name for a goalie... "Noonan, miss it Noonan, miss it ...".

The TSN feed is also available via ATDHE and channelsurfing.net .... With the USA broadcast on the NHL Network (USA).

Speed Kills. And right now the USA is speedier.

It's Dean Blais Hockey.

The NHL Network's promotional ad urges viewer to watch the game so they can see future NHLers. Which made me wonder - "on a typical roster" UND vs USA National U-20 Team, which has more future NHLers? * The recent Sioux teams have been in the 7-12 range. * Not sure how Team USA has been ... Anyone have a sense?

That would be a very fair weather thing to do.

What you're missing is its the football schools, and their AD's driving the bus. They would leave UND behind - UND is not a Big Ten school.

Oh, hi there Mr. Lucia.

Very quiet here. Sioux giving UMD no room to skate, no room to make plays, getting the puck out of trouble, and getting good goaltending. Overall another nice period. In the words of Jonathon Toews, "Finish 'em off, boys!!"

1:35 left

PK successful. Eidsness standing tall. 3-2.

Mankato 2, Minneapolis 1, 6 minutes left in the 3rd.

Oh, I feel much better now. Thanks for setting me straight. And I agree with Burd; its a great story.

OK, call me crazy. Among NHL scorers through 12/1/09, which school has the alumni with the greatest points so far this season: (A) North Dakota State (B) UND Answer: Trick question. It's a tie. NDSU (Bottineau) Dustin Penner and UND Zach Parise with 30 points each. Strange but true. http://www.nhl.com/ice/playerstats.htm#?navid=nav-sts-indiv

It was a masterpiece of misdirection. It happened right in front of me, and I still barely saw it. Trupp crossed behind the net, and he passed it in the same motion as if he were stickhandling. All the Zeroes followed him, and when he passed it back to Malone, the net was wide open and Malone could have pushed it in with a dustpan. Trupp has been on a roll...

Other stats from NHL.com ... former Sioux in the top 30 of various stats: Goals: Parise 13 (11th) Assists: Parise 15 (18th), Zajac 14 (26th) Points: Parise 28 (7th) Shots: Parise 99 (2nd), Blake 74 (23rd) Faceoffs: Toews 60.1% (4th) Johnson 56.4% (10th) * (Toews at almost 80% on the powerplay!) Hits: Greene 79 (4th) Blocked Shots: Greene 54 (12th) Giveaways: nobody (trick question) Takeaways: Blake 25 (4th) Penalties: nobody (obviously goons) Shootouts: Toews 3-3 (4th), Parise 2-4 (18th)